COM NET NEWS Vol. 1 No. 6 September Part 1--Original and Other News >From the Editor As indicated in the last issue of COM NET NEWS, I am requesting donations from readers to help defer the costs of production of this newsletter. I am requesting a donation of $35 per year for individuals and $75 per year for companies and organizations. Non-U.S. subscribers, please send donation in U.S. currency. But, please note that this is a request--you will not be dropped from the subscription list if you don't contribute. A number of readers requested to unsubscribe because of the donation. Please don't feel that you have to pay. If you can't afford it or have too many other paid subscriptions, or whatever, don't worry, you will still receive COM NET NEWS. Also, I will continue to post COM NET NEWS on various listservs and the it may be freely distributed among groups for noncommercial purposes. The request for donations is due to the time and other costs incurred in putting together COM NET NEWS. It is hoped that you feel that it is of value to you, and you can be assured that I will continue to better COM NET NEWS. Back issues of COM NET NEWS are archived in the Well gopher (gopher.well.sf.ca.us) under "Community/" As a reminder, this issue of COM NET NEWS reflects the suggestions of several subscribers. COM NET NEWS now contains a Table of Contents, and, the newsletter is broken down into two parts--Part 1--Original and Other News; and Part 2--News from Other Newsletter Sources, e.g., Edupage. The two parts will be emailed to you as separate messages. Richard W. Bryant, Editor RW Bryant Associates Advanced Technology Market Research & Com Net Consultants P.O. Box 1828 El Prado, NM 87529 Tel/fax: 505-758-1919 rbryant@hydra.unm.edu ****************************************************************** ****************************************************************** ORIGINAL AND OTHER NEWS ------------------------------------------------------------------------ La Plaza/Fielding Institute Rountable, Taos, NM URISA '94 Annual Conference & Exposition in Milwaukee, WI PAVNET Gopher Server OTANEWS Listserv Now Available Selected OTA publications Available Via FTP Politicians Have It Wrong: Universal Service for the Infobahn Isn't a Reform, It's a Problem. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ LA PLAZA/FIELDING INSTITUTE ROUNDTABLE, TAOS, NM La Plaza and the Fielding Institute held a jointly sponsored roundtable over the weekend of 9-11 September 1994 in Taos, New Mexico. The purpose of the roundtable was to discuss and "brainstorm" ideas concerning the development of community networks--particularly the La Plaza Telecommunity. Approximately 25 attendees from around the U.S. convened to discuss issues in four main topic areas: education, community outreach, technology, and business/economic development. Working documents were generated at the end of the Roundtable which may eventually bainable community networks. The proceedings of this conference is being completed now and a more complete account will be presented in the October issue of COM NET NEWS. URISA '94 ANNUAL CONFERENCE & EXPOSITION IN MILWAUKEE >From 5-11 August 1994, some 3000 Conferees from 50 States, 11 Provinces and 23 Countries representing public & private sector administrators, managers,technicians and users of data viewed the wide range of available applications, experience, success and failures. Randy Gschwind, Conference Chair, and URISA have brought together the public and private sector by providing a forum for the exchange of ideas that foster enhanced quality, asset maximization and reduced cost through the productive use of available, organized information detail. URISA has encouraged the effective interaction of technology with urban & regional data since 1963 to assist development expressing the interdependence of people, data & technology. Nine tracks covered such diverse, but related subjects as demographics, dollars/$ense, industry, infrastructures/transportation, integration, land/resource management, public safety, research/technology, and standards. Keynote speakers - Monday - Professor James B. Quinn, Chair U. S. National Research Council Committee, emphasized the importance of the service industry, showing dramatic results, but no means of measurement, other than the knowledge that critical data was made available to make knowledgeable decisions impacting the bottom line. Tuesday - Robert J. Woods, Manager Federal Telecommunications System (FTS2000), expressed the government focus on service to the citizen initiative. The fundamental shift in government systems design from inner agency workings to customer access needs of integrated voice, data and video telecommunications. Thursday luncheon Michael W. Dobson, VP for Industry Affairs at Rand McNally Publishing Group, espoused the critical need for friendly interfaces and software structuring to make information easily available to users through interoperability of technologies. "nobody is born dumb, but information technology can make them think they are......". Special events Student Presentation "think-tank" for educational outreach in geography, mathematics, social studies, and science impact on real world problems using spatial information systems (SIT:UPSS) with Project Showcase; Mapping Lead Exposure; Citizen Access; Direct Marketing; Federal Geographic Data Committee including National Spatial Data Clearinghouse & Metadata Standard Training, FGDC Geospatial Data Partnerships Forum, Tiger Enhancement Technical Working Group; ESRI User Group Meeting; INTERGRAPH User Group Meeting; Exemplary Systems In Government Awards were made to Wilson Automated Government Enhancement System for Small Municipal Systems; Presidio Graphic Management Information System, National Park Service at the Presidio, S.F., Ca. , for Operations Automation Systems Award; NeighborLINE, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, Pa., Honorable Mention; Executive Information System, City of Missauga, On. , Canada, Corporate Systems Award; City of Providence, R. I. , Providence Plan, Honorable Mention. The Workshops, Technical Tours and Social Events were all linked together in a Network that enchanced and encouraged the exchange of information with technology methods between technicians, exhibitors, users, public and attendees. Next years conference will be in San Antonio, July 16-20. Further information may be obtained from: URISA at 202.289-1685. ______ksipos@pacs.pha.pa.us for Philadelphia Area Computer Society... Source: Daniel A. Updegrove University of Pennsylvania Associate Vice Provost 3401 Walnut, Suite 221A Information Systems and Computing Phila, PA 19104-6228 Executive Director 215 898-2883 Data Communications & Computing Service fax 898-9348 ===================================== PAVNET-ONLINE GOPHER SERVER Currently, promising programs around issues of community, youth, and family violence, substance abuse, and victims rights are listed on PAVNET. Sub-categories of Prevention, Enforcement, and Treatment/Rehab hold descriptions and contact sources. Foundation and federal funding sources are also listed under seperate directories. PAVNET is still under construction and evaluation so only a sample of these sources are available. PAVNET's gopher server can be accessed under the CYFERNET directory under USDA in Federal Government gophers. PAVNET has not established a domain name of its own since it is still under construction. PAVNET-Online is a free service that is part of a federal initiative among the U.S. Departments of Justice, Education, Agriculture, Health and Human Services. Labor, and Defense. Access via telnet by commercial or free-net system is supported currently, but we soon it will have email access using Almanac software. PAVNET will establish links to other federal agencies with similar data as well as to private gophers and BBSs nationwide. The organization hopes to get a grantsmanship tutorial and discussion list up by the Fall and is waiting for evaluations for over 500 effective programs to be returned and typeset before posting the rest of its resource database. Source: John Gladstone 301/504-5462; NAL, 10301 Balt. Blvd., Beltsville Md 20705-2351 ************************************* OTANEWS LISTSERV NOW AVAILABLE The Congressional Office of Technology Assessment is the research arm of the U.S. Congress. It publishes reports covering a very wide range of industries, topics, and areas of interest to most all. The OTA has a well deserved reputation of excellent research work. (They do their homework. Editor) The Office of Technology Assessment of the United States Congress has introduced an electronic mailing service to provide news about recently released OTA publications to those with access to Internet e-mail. When an OTA publication is released to the public, OTA will distribute an electronic version of the report brief or news release to readers who subscribe to OTANEWS. HOW TO SUBSCRIBE To subscribe to OTA's electronic mailing list, you must have e- mail access to the Internet. Then follow these steps: 1) Address an e-mail message to listserv@ota.gov 2) Leave "subject" blank. Go to the body of the message. 3) In the message space, type subscribe OTANEWS your e-mail address. For example: subscribe OTANEWS mdexter@ota.gov 4) Send the message. 5) You will get a confirmation that your subscription has been entered. If you encounter difficulties, send an e-mail message to postmaster@ota.gov The information you receive about newly released OTA publications will include order information as well as instructions for downloading the publication via ftp from OTA if it is available electronically. OTA is a nonpartisan analytical agency that serves the U.S. Congress. Its purpose is to aid Congress with the complex and often highly technical issues that increasingly affect our society. Source: Martha Dexter mdexter@ota.gov Director, Information Management (202) 228-6233 Office of Technology Assessment fax (202) 228-6098 U.S. Congress Washington, DC 20510-8025 *********************************************************** SELECTED OTA PUBLICATIONS AVAILABLE VIA FTP Selected OTA publications are now available via FTP. The following address information will connect you to the ftp server at OTA: * ftp to otabbs.ota.gov (152.63.20.13) * login as anonymous * password is your e-mail address * all of the publications are in the /pub directory Some of the most recent OTA publications available which are relevant to the Net community are indictated below. NOTE: Each publication has a designated subdirectory under the /pub directory, and each publication is divided into separate files by chapter. All of the files are ASCII text files. The following publications are available in the subdirectories indicated: **************** September 1993 **************** Making Government Work: Electronic Delivery of Federal Services, 188 p. /pub/making.government.work Protecting Privacy in Computerized Medical Information, 168p. /pub/protecting.privacy.medical.info *************** April 1994 *************** The Social Security Administration's Decentralized Computer Strategy: Issues and Options, 96 p. /pub/soc.sec *************** May 1994 *************** Electronic Enterprises: Looking to the Future, 188 p. /pub/elenter General Publications OTA Catalog of Publications, March 1994, 64 p., updated regularly /pub/catalog Health Care Reform Brochure, June 1994, 10 p. /pub/healthref ******************** Contact Information ******************** OTA Congressional and Public Affairs (202) 224-9241 cpa@ota.gov OTA Publications Distribution (202) 224-8996 pubsrequest@ota.gov ===================================================== POLITCICANS HAVE IT WRONG: UNIVERSAL SERVICE FOR THE INFOBAHN ISN'T A REFORM, ITS A PROBLEM The magazine "Wired" recently published what it called "...an essential primer on a crucial aspect of telecommunications reform legislation currently before Congress." The following is a press release received over the net. 15 August 1994, San Francisco - As Wired's John Browning points out in a seminal overview in the September issue, politicians love to give universal service lip service, but this hallmark of 1930's telecommunications legislation is an obsolete policy for the networked world of the information age. The real problem for the 21st century is a surplus, not shortage, of bandwidth, and the solution is universal access. Because of the extremely timely nature of this story, the editors of Wired pre-released it to members of the US House and Senate as they deliberate three telecommunications bills. The principle behind the old policy of universal service is that everyone should have the right to telephone service at an affordable price. Politicians, regulators, and so-called citizens' advocates are now arguing that this model should be applied to the pricing and distribution of information services. The three reform bills currently before Congress all call for one form of universal service or another. Unfortunately, this model is obsolete. Formulated at a time when there was a shortage of bandwidth (in other words, a total lack of connection to the telecommuniations grid), it is irrelevant in an era when there will be at least six different technologies competing to bring telecommunications services to consumers (phone, cable, cellular, satellite, wireless, and power company). Browning argues that the focus should instead be on insuring maximum access to content providers, to guarantee that the pipes are full for competitors. Open access regulation focuses on opportunity rather than duty. Instead of saying what services networks should provide at what price, the point of access regulation is simply to require big network operators to make available to everybody, on a non-discriminatory basis, whatever services they do provide - and, more importantly, to offer the same access to the underlying technologies from which those services are constructed. This is not blind de-regulation. On the contrary, open access requires the government to intervene vigorously - particularly to ensure that small, new competitors get to use the existing telecom infrastructure on the same terms as the entrenched (soon-to-be-former) monopolies that built it. It also forces companies to offer services to all customers - without, for example, requiring that somebody buy their telephone service in order to watch their movies on cable TV. "Unlike mandated services," Browning explains, "mandated access promises to break open entrenched cable-television and telephone monopolies so that competition and choice can begin in earnest." Browning's piece gives a summary of the telecom-reform legislation that has surfaced in 1994 - each bill containing a mixture of subsidies, service regulation, and competition. Both the Markey-Fields bill and the Brooks-Dingell bill passed in the US House of Representatives in late June. These serve to create competition in telecom markets where previously only monopolies existed, and lift restrictions on the seven RBOCs created by AT&T's breakup. The third key piece of legislation, the Communications Act of 1994, encourages competition in telecom and cable industries, gives the FCC more regulatory flexibility, and ensures the preservation of universal services. Browning concludes that "by pushing companies to offer network services at something like the cost of providing them - instead of a fictional price contrived for social convenience - regulators can put networks on sound economic footing and make them independent of the whims of politics and subsidy." Universal excess The fact that universal service is difficult to administer is not by itself a compelling argument for burying it - even slowly and with great respect. But many of the same changes that complicate the practice of universal service also undermine its moral foundation. Since the Post Roads Act of 1866 - which in return for the right to string wires along public roads required telegraph operators to carry, without discrimination, the messages of anybody who wanted to use those wires - America's government has based its regulation of electronic media on the assumption of shortage. The Post Roads Act was in large part inspired by a nearly successful attempt by telegraph operators to put the fledgling Associated Press out of business by refusing to carry its messages, which competed with their own news services. To prevent other such abuses of power, the regulation of radio, television, and telephones has been based on the idea that those scarce resources must be regulated for the public good. Technology and competition, however, now promise to turn shortage to glut. Yet, all of the proposals to bring competition to network markets are predicated on the idea that technology will create, if not excess, at least an adequate supply of bandwidth and electronic expression so that new information services will be freely available. Rep. Ed Markey, chairman of the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and Finance, says "someday, choosing which network to use will be no different from choosing which kiosk on Harvard Square to buy your newspaper from." Russ Neuman of MIT's Media Lab argues that someday soonish most homes will have a choice of connecting to five high-capacity networks: one built on the telephone system, one built on cable television, one built on the electric power network, a wireless network for personal communications devices, and another wireless network built from the spaces freed up in the radio spectrum as today's analog television signals go digital. With the advent of real choice, the moral bargain underlying universal service - that in return for the use of scarce public resources, telecom companies must give service back to the community - becomes largely void. If the resources are not scarce, then the moral duties owed the community by telecom providers are no greater - and no less - than those owed by other firms. The way to recognize that change, and to eliminate many of the innovation-crushing practical difficulties in administering universal service, is to change emphasis from regulation based on service to regulation based on access. Open access regulation focuses on opportunity rather than duty. Instead of saying what services networks should provide at what price, the point of access regulation is simply to require big network operators to make available to everybody, on a non-discriminatory basis, whatever services they do provide - and, importantly, the underlying technologies from which those services are constructed. It lets customers decide what services they want. Better, unlike mandated services, mandated access promises to break open entrenched cable-television and telephone monopolies so that competition and choice can begin in earnest. An easy way to see the difference between access regulation and service regulation is to consider the "set-top box," the computer on the TV which will provide brains for interactive multimedia entertainment. Service regulation is when the government specifies a minimum level of service, and sets rates for those minimum services - as cable regulators do now. In set-top-box terms, the regulations might require, say, 200 channels for $25 a month. Access regulation would set neither rates nor service requirements; the assumption is that competition will keep pressure on price and quality. Instead, access regulations force companies to offer services to all customers - without, for example, requiring that somebody buy its telephone service in order to watch its movies on cable television. More important, access regulations also require big, entrenched companies to make available to competitors the components from which their services are constructed. In set-top-box terms, this means that customers gain the right to buy, say, cable programming from Time Warner, a set-top box from Ted Turner, and intelligent agents from General Magic - or whichever company offers the best services (whether it be the firm who laid the wire to the door or not). Time Warner, for its part, has to offer an interface from its cables to Ted Turner's set-top box with the same price and performance as that offered for its own boxes. Access regulations thus boost choice and competition at two levels. First, they eliminate the possibility that existing companies can use their huge investments in infrastructure to squeeze out new competitors. The regulations would enable anybody and everybody to have access to, say, installed coaxial cable at roughly the same price at which the cable companies' accountants charge the costs of that cable to their own businesses. Second, they enable customers to mix and match various offerings from a variety of companies to create services they want. Universal access works successfully in long-distance telecommunications - where competition fueled by access regulation has improved quality and choice even as it has reduced prices. So legislators have incorporated an ambitious variety of access regulation into legislation - particularly into the Markey-Fields bill. Not only does the bill require big companies to give competitors intimate access to their networks, it also requires them to keep expanding those networks so that lack of capacity cannot itself become a constraint on access. Telephone companies venturing into cable would be required by Markey-Fields to build as much cable capacity as there was demand for channels - with the FCC to define "demand for channels" - and to make it available to all on equal terms. The hope, at least, is that electronic innovation and electronic bandwidth will become the printing press of the next millennium - and that cheap, easy-to-produce video 'zines will surge alongside the paper ones as technology's contribution to the ability of all the artists, college students, political activists, lunatics, and sports fanatics to express themselves. Abandoning universal service need not mean abandoning equality. On the contary. If information services are essential and high cost is denying these services to the poor, government can give the disadvantaged the means to buy some minimum level of service - as it does now with Medicare and food stamps. (After all, nobody is suggesting that restaurants should pay more for food and supermarket prices should be regulated to provide cross-subsidies for universal service of nutrition among the poor.) Equally, instead of requiring cable operators and other information-service providers to set aside capacity for free (or at least below cost) community broadcasting, government can encourage the growth of capacity and provide grants for those whose voices it reckons should be heard - as it now does for artists. There are already interesting experiments along these lines. Both the Commerce Department and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting have recently created grants for community-oriented networks. New York state has experimented with novel ways of financing telecoms for the very poorest. But in order to take these experiments further, politicians throughout Washington - and particularly Al Gore - will have to indulge in an uncomfortable honesty. To imply, as Gore now does when he "challenges" network providers to wire every school, hospital, and library in America by 2000, that it is possible to provide ubiquitous, high-bandwidth networks without either new taxes or high prices for some new services. Universal service cross-subsidies are a tax - albeit a tax buried in the price of services and beneath layers of obscure cost allocation and pricing regulations. They are a particularly inefficient and wasteful tax. And, worst of all, they are a deceptive and distorting tax, a tax that makes it hard to see the real costs of the building blocks of tomorrow's networks and thus the real opportunities in building the networks that will change the world. That is no foundation on which to build the future. If networks are indeed the future of America, at least the nation should begin building them as it would speak over them - with honesty at all times, even when the honest message is not the one people want to hear. More important, honesty underlies the sort of regulatory system in which networks can realize their potential. By pushing companies to offer network services at something like the cost of providing them - instead of a fictional price connived for social convenience - regulators can put networks on a sound economic footing, and so make them independent of the whims of politics and subsidy. By requiring entrenched giants to provide basic technology to others as they provide it unto themselves, regulators can set free the vast investments already made in telecom infrastructure for expansion and innovation, and so fulfill the public trust that built them. By allowing innovation to rise or fall on its own merits - rather than because of lobbyists' pressure - regulators can enable Americans to choose for themselves the way they would like to communicate, to learn, and to use the vast potential of the new technology they are creating. Building upon the sound foundations of real competition and honest pricing, people can begin to build for themselves the sorts of networks they want - rather than waiting to be served. John Browning is a writer and consultant living in London and a contibutor to The Economist, and wrote "Power PC: Reengineering Regulation" for Wired 2.07. Wired 2.09 is currently available on newsstands for US$4.95 or by sending e-mail to subscriptions@wired.com. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Will.Kreth HotWired +1.415.222.6345 [vox] Online.Ambassador 510 3rd.St. +1.415.904.0669 [fax] info@wired.com SF.CA.94107.USA http://www.wired.com/ ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ The "Information Hypeway" doesn't exist. The "Information Ecology" does. Check it out. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- =-=-=-=-=Copyright 1993,4 Wired Ventures Ltd. 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